About

2014 BIG NEWS

In early 2014, there was an event that shook the bike community in Brett Cotter’s home town of Taupo, New Zealand- a newly installed Giant 3 metre Bike Statue had been viciously vandalised.

From this, an idea, an ambition, and a crusade to help have Taupo’s Giant Bike repaired and back up again unfolded.

The genesis of THE BIG BIKE FILM NIGHT was born.

A collection of generous film makers, film production companies and organisations were approached and they whole heartedly supported this creative idea, along with them came a willing and caring local bike community.

2015 BIG HELP

February 2015 saw the inaugural screening of THE BIG BIKE FILM NIGHT, in the exciting Rotorua Bike Festival programme. Several months later Starlight Cinema was chosen as the venue for Taupo; it didn’t disappoint with a SELL OUT crowd on hand to support this great cause. The stylish Tivoli Cinema in Cambridge was selected for the final 2015 viewing and once again patronage and enthusiasm was high.

Organising THE BIG BIKE FILM NIGHT was a way of putting the ‘fun’ into fundraising and from the successful screenings $2300 was raised towards the Giant bike’s restoration.

Sharing the best cycling short films from around the world with our audience succeeded, and fans of the event eagerly enquired about when it was returning.

2016 BIG TIME

A new year and a new idea. With the Giant bike back up, Brett saw an opportunity to build a small business ‘pedaling films’ and curated a new collection of short cycling films and took them around the country.

During 2016 we visited new places, made some new bike friends and for several hours pedal patrons were in their happy place.

2017 BIG FUTURE

2017 was a heck of a ride and we stretched things big-time! This moveable feast- a travelling bike-themed short-film festival went full tilt through 2017.

Brett had a strong desire to make the event bigger and better and introduced several new initiatives to the event.

The initiative that Brett was most proud about over 2017 was his desire to have a partner film event to go alongside THE BIG BIKE FILM NIGHT. Introducing the Cycle Chic Film Tour with a range of short cycling movies to inspire, encourage and celebrate women who love to bike was the biggest challenge he had faced from curating various collections’ over the last three years. Seeing the response from the audiences’ made it all worth while and satisfying.

2017 also saw us take the two collections ‘across the ditch’ to a select few cities in Australia. Starting slowly in Canberra, Hobart and Melbourne with the intention of returning in 2018 to these locations and others on a larger scale tour.

An opportunity to showcase feature length documentaries saw The Big Bike Film Night ‘Feature Series’ introduced, catering for those that crave even more bike action. In 2017 there were two outstanding feature length documentaries touring.

ALL FOR ONE – from humble beginnings to the international circuit, the Australian cycling team -GREENEDGE became an unlikely inspiring story, and this film followed their incredible journey.

LONDON. EDINBURGH. LONDON – This is one of Britain’s great cycling challenges, and the cyclists were not only tested physically, but faced a mental challenge that forced them to look inside and find resolve they never knew they had.

Having top quality films shown in top quality cinema environments is paramount to the vision of Brett and by the end of 2017 there was a multitude of events all under The Big Bike Film Night’s banner.

Striving to have more fun, more screenings, bigger audiences and creating great events is what it is about, all this- dedicated to the humble bike.

2018

We kicked the year off showcasing our ‘Feature Series’ screenings of the stunning Freeride mountain biking documentary THE MOMENT; which was embraced and enjoyed by bike fans across the country over February and March.

May and June – Touring with THE BIG BIKE FILM NIGHT 2018 line-up across New Zealand.

July-August – a new adventure with the 2018 Cycle Chic Film Tour.

August- October – To Australia with screenings in Melbourne, Bendigo, Canberra, Hobart, Launceston, Brisbane, and Sydney between the two collections.

2019

We were privileged to present for our ‘Feature Series’ audiences’ the inspiring NZ made cycling documentary ONE DAY AHEAD on 8 ordinary Kiwis journey taking on all 21 stages of the Tour de France one day ahead of the event, raising moneys for the Mental Health Foundation of NZ. The “WORLD Premiere” took place on Friday 25th January at Cambridge, and then visited Wellington, Auckland and Christchurch over 27 Feb-1 March.

THE BIG BIKE FILM NIGHT tour across New Zealand with our short film line-up commences on 8 March and rides into a whole lot of places around the country to 26 May.

OurCycle Chic Film Tour takes a rest this year, as we have not seen enough (and the right) content to produce a 2019 collection.

Our visit to Australia is still being worked on, and once we have finalised dates and locations we will update this here.